| re: Sondheim and Me -- Full Disclosure: Not all that Interesting | |
| Last Edit: Chazwaza 07:56 pm EST 03/11/22 | |
| Posted by: Chazwaza 07:49 pm EST 03/11/22 | |
| In reply to: Sondheim and Me -- Full Disclosure: Not all that Interesting - BroadwayTonyJ 07:26 pm EST 03/11/22 | |
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| Thanks for sharing that. Definitely interesting. For what it's worth, I've worked with and spoken with Sondheim quite a few times, but no I've never proposed this to him. But yes, of course it's easy for me to say. But none of what you say is relevant for answering away or dismissing my proposal of why I would have done this if I were him-- i would say it doesn't even directly respond to my actual proposal. I honestly don't see how this is any different from "don't wait for permission or invitation, go out and make the thing you want to see made" advice for artists... if I had the money, I'd fund my own feature film, or my own theatrical production, rather than having the money but saying "no, if someone wants to film this then great but I wrote it, that's all I can do... despite that, yes, I have way more than enough money to make this happen comfortably, and have the desire to see my work preserved in the best possible productions, like it has been with Sweeney and Sunday and ITW and Passion etc." Your answer and his definitely over emphasize the work involved for him or the know-how, or the risk. It's not a risk to spend this money if you have so much to losing it to this filming projects wouldn't make a dent in your finances but would leave you and the world with the films of your work you'd want to see. I personally want the world to have them, maybe he didn't. It is very easy to hire someone to use your own capital to pay for something. This is not about finding a "project" and figuring out the finances or raising the money, let alone doing it himself. He is a very rich person, rich people do not do everything themselves. This is a copout reason. I said very clearly he might not only not make money doing this but might lose it. That's fine. If I had tens of millions of dollars or more still in my 70s let alone 80s and 90s, I'd be very very happy to spend a fraction of that to preserve excellent productions of my work, especially the pieces that are often produced poorly or rarely. You may not think that's worth doing, and Sondheim may not have. I'm not saying either of you do. However, *I* do. And I would if I had been in his position. Not to be dismissive but none of the things you summarized Sondheim saying or what you yourself said have much to do with what I'm proposing. Again, it would be incredibly easy for him to hire people and get this stuff done. He could even hire someone to hire the people to figure it out and then to execute it. And then either the persons hired to be in charge of it find buyers for the project and he gets his money back and has his shows preserved on video forever, or they don't find buyers and he spent a fraction of him money and has his shows preserved on video forever. It's also very possible he just does not care or specifically want any one production of his shows to be filmed and looked to as the gold standard for doing that show. But he certainly seemed happy enough to have it done for Follies in Concert, Pacific Overtures, Sweeney Todd, Sunday in the Park with George, Into the Woods, and Passion... so ... he seems happy for it to happen if someone wants to and is paying for it. Again, I get that. But for the 3rd time, it would be unspeakably easy for him to hire someone to manage all of this, and he had more than enough money to fund it personally whether they ever found a buyer to pay it back to him or not (though I think it's very possible he would have, at least for a Sondheim Celebration festival documentary). It's a moot point, he never did it when those productions I listed were running, and he's gone now so we can't ask further about it or pitch it to him to do for future productions. |
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